


I knew you'd linger like a tattoo kiss

by innsaei



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt, Friends With Benefits, M/M, Post-Break Up, atsumu is a hoe through and through, boxer sakusa, love is a scam, mature content slightly, non linear, one sided pining, there is no cheating involved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:34:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26513755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/innsaei/pseuds/innsaei
Summary: The way they write in bold on cigarette packets : smoking kills, Miya Atsumu came with a warning too.alt: The art of gentle seduction and heartbreak, an exclusive lesson by Miya Atsumu for Sakusa Kiyoomi
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Comments: 7
Kudos: 38
Collections: SakuAtsu Week 2020





	I knew you'd linger like a tattoo kiss

**Author's Note:**

> So, I never thought I would end up writing a sakuatsu fic but here we are adding another work to this ship of less than 8-panel canon interactions. this idea was initially born out of my own matsuhana drabble and then someone told me about boxer sakusa. Then god only knows what happened. I really hope you guys enjoy reading it and please i am attaching a playlist for yall. please listen to the playlist [ here ](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1qWkna82o8D9BAc28tGGwi?si=Bjlz46g7QlyMvWgkAXFVRA)

_He does something to me, that boy. Every time._

_It’s his only detriment. He steps on my heart. He makes me cry_

_-The Book Thief_

  
  


Someone once said that gentleness sometimes comes, not from the absence of violence, but despite the abundance of it. And when this reached the ears of one Sakusa Kiyoomi, he thinks poets and artists can be liars too. 

So he rewrites the lines in his head. 

_You are wrong, Mr. Richard._

_For some of us, gentleness sometimes comes with the abundance of all the pain and hurt. It can be bitter and it can be tempting, alluring and addicting like storms and tempests, but it's not without its own violence._

And Kiyoomi knows this better than anyone.

For it is, to him, a bandaid placed on a wound and then ripped and then placed and then ripped, over and over again till he loses count.

Which is why he raises a toast to himself every time he lets gentleness in with all its facade and knife edges, holds it in the curve of his palms and makes himself believe that somewhere there is something truly gentle left in _him_. 

*

Kiyoomi chuckles bitterly as he leans against the cold wall, watching with lidded eyes as his right hand slowly unravels the cotton wrap while letting the end fall on the ground with a gentle thud. The hazy beam of the streetlight outside filters through the ventilator window and illuminates the otherwise dark hall. There are vague shapes in the darkened corners of the room- dumbbells, twisted chains, foam rollers and stuffings fallen out of torn punching bags. There is the musty smell of the room and the traces of alcohol on his neck and breath when he closes his eyes, inhaling deeply as his hand moves deftly through the familiar ritual.

The cotton wrap loops around his thumb before wrapping around his wrist thrice, tightening but not tightening, enough to keep his hand safe, enough to keep his bones and his tendons from breaking. And in his mind, it’s not a grey cotton wrap anymore but fingers, long and calloused yet gentle,wrapped around his wrist. 

The tape moves slowly around his palm twice then rounds up from the back of his thumb before winding through his fingers in crosses and he imagines the width between his fingers stretching uniformly. The feeling remains between him and the memories etched on his flesh. 

The way the wrap stretches tightly across the skin of his interdigital folds, it's nothing but a shadow to the way Miya's fingers fill up the space. 

And he whimpers again, in the chambers of his heart. Like he did and he will again. 

_Miya Atsumu._

It’s a fleeting image of a blond man whispering drunken words into his ear, a lazy smile hanging on his lips as he intertwined their fingers under dim lights. In his memory, Sakusa sees the smile etched on his face as he leaned into the warmth and the gentle touch. There was love and love and more love. And it's an orange haze of memories and he remembers thinking then of how he wanted time to freeze in that frame. 

But it's fleeting, as told before and shall be told again.

And now when the image ripples and falls away, he can almost taste the receding aftertaste of love. 

The cold creeps up his spine, seeping into the crevices of his body and swallowing the warmth in his memory. There is a blue haze and now the images in his head are blurred between days and nights he wishes he couldn’t remember. They are of nights Sakusa stayed up waiting for him to come home and of days when Miya tumbled into their apartment at dawn, reeking of alcohol. And Sakusa remembers the relief coursing through his veins every time he realized that there were no unfamiliar scents. 

Just the sickly lingering smell of cheap vodka entwined with the scent of falling out of love. 

  
  
  


Kiyoomi tightens the wrap more, letting the pain overwhelm the memory and he straightens up to slowly walk towards the punching bag hanging to his left. It sways infinitesimally from the hook, the rattling of the chain cutting softly through the silence of the hall. He steps closer until the bag is within the reach of his raised arm and inhales deeply. The space between him and the bag is still and in the stagnant air, there is nothing but the overpowering smell of leather mixed with sweat from nights he spent here. And it’s welcoming, the way it fills his senses and covers the scent of alcohol in his bloodstream and memory of the evening not so long ago. 

Sakusa involuntarily lashes out at the bag, sending a sharp clang as the chain rattles under the sudden movement while it all comes back. The evening with its smoky haze, the sounds of indistinct conversations in an obscure bar, the clinking of glasses between strangers and the sight of _him._

Gritting his teeth, his eyes are a shade of midnight black as he wordlessly positions himself in the right stance, the muscles in his form buzzing from the adrenaline coursing through him. 

Like a predator moving in on his prey, Sakusa shifts his body weight with an undeniable grace from his bent knees to his back leg. Under the white light filtering in through the uncleaned window and the shadows cast across the room, it’s almost like watching a dance to kill when he rotates his lead foot and knee towards the right. The lines of his muscles gleam in the shadow, slick with sweat. And he twists his hips in the blink of an eye taking his torso along as his arm extends, the elbow joints at an impeccably correct right angle. When his fist connects with the leather, the knuckles collide with the bag and the way the bag sways in a wide arc is nothing but an indicator that in a fight, he might have won with this left hook. But there is no fight, no opponents, no one to circle and kill in the ring. 

And there won't be anyone tomorrow or the day after. 

For the prey is himself and no one else. 

Sakusa kiyoomi: heartbroken once and twice and thrice and now the numbers are but a fuzzy trip in his head. For never has a man been born before him who is so ready to ruin himself over and over again. 

He lets out a guttural scream, so unlike him, so unlike the man everyone sees him to be, and it rips through his throat, bouncing off the wall. There is a burning rage hissing through his body begging to be released, like acid slowly eating him up from inside and he moves like a blur. 

_Jab, hook,shuffle, jab, hook._

And it goes on, the pain slowly becoming distinct, shooting through his knuckles all the way up to his arms.

There are no techniques and no rules. 

The chain rattles ceaselessly while the dust swirls around him as his breathing becomes heavy. And when the movements become harder and his arms start to cut through the air slowly, his mind starts conjuring up the memories.

They come in waves, like a silk cloth gently tightening its leash around him. Before he knows, the ground beneath his feet feels the first drop of a silvery teardrop.

Uncaring or caring too much to the point he feels numb, Sakusa continues while the tears roll down the slope of his cheeks mixing with the sweat before hitting the ground. His knuckles connect with greater exertion now, lingering on the punching bag for longer seconds. In his mind,he vaguely feels each hit resounding within his ribcage brings forth the torrent of his suppressed memories. 

_Left hook_

The man with the tangerine hair threw his head back, his laugh echoing in the dimly lit bar and the hollow chambers of Sakusa’s heart.

Kiyoomi sat, ten feet away from them, watching silently as Atsumu raised his hand, a little too familiarly, to push the orange strands of hair off his forehead and the other man stopped mid-laugh to lean slightly into the touch. There was a heavy pause when the stranger hesitated and Kiyoomi didn’t miss the way Miya slowly moved his hand down the slope of his cheek before coming to rest underneath his chin, his thumb lightly grazing the stranger’s lips. He didn’t turn his gaze away when Miya leaned in, whispering into the man’s ear. Or when his lips slowly brushed past his temple or when his hand deftly pulled the bar stool closer, their breaths fogging up the glasses kept next to them on the counter. He didn’t dare look away when Miya’s lips moved past the line of the naive stranger’s cheek and came to rest on his lips. 

Their skin glowed amber under the lowlights of the bar, merging into each other as the distance between them remained in just the fabrics of their clothes separating their bodies.

And through all of these, he sat there, with a cigarette dangling between his fingers, watching as a stranger whispered Miya’s name while their lips moved in messy, sloppy kisses, fumbling and fighting as strangers do.

  
  


_Jab_

The stranger tangled his fingers through soft, blond strands of hair gasping every now and then as Atsumu ran his tongue of sugary words down the line of his neck. He watched as Miya’s hand traced the skin beneath the man’s clothes, fingers gliding smoothly down towards his hips. They fumbled and fought for dominance, top lip over bottom lip, teeth clashing, hands tangling and untangling, flesh over flesh. 

And when the man crumpled completely under Miya's touch, coming undone at his words, Sakusa chuckled bitterly. 

But he stayed, unmoving and still. 

Afterall, how could he have looked away when his eyes were held by Atsumu’s honey brown eyes, glistening like copper penny under the dim glow of the night?

_Do you see this, Kiyoomi?_

_Watch._

_Don’t you dare look away._

It came as a whisper, travelling through the expanse of ten feet between them and settling in the corner of his heart that he knows can never be someone else’s. 

  
  
  


In the darkness of the booth, Sakusa Kiyoomi had sat alone, as the smoke from his cigarette crept up and clouded his face. Enclosing him with a sense of entitlement like subway crowds reaching into private spaces, like flyers shoved into faces or like the cold, calculated touches Miya leaves every night on his skin, enough but never enough. 

He laughed as his eyes glazed over, the burning chemical filling him up akin to the way the last dredges of Atsumu love did. 

Fleeting. Evaporating.

Killing him slowly.

The way they write in bold on cigarette packets: **smoking kills,** Miya Atsumu came with a warning too. 

_Cross_

The tangerine haired man with his tinkling laugh and roaming fingers, arched his back as Atsumu's fingertips traced the blemishes on the bare skin of his neck causing the blond man to smile. He tugged at Miya’s belt, tilting his head in the way the recess light from above caught his eyes. They were pretty, Sakusa had noted, but not enamouring enough and he knew Atsumu mirrored his thoughts. Because his smile was practiced, his touch so calculative and his eyes were not on the man but were on Kiyoomi sitting far behind, in the darkness of the corner.

The man is nothing to Miya but just a hazy august evening. And just another addition to all the names that remain a blur in his head, changing again and again till he is a mess of unfamiliar scents. 

Hence,unfortunately, like all tragic lovers do, Sakusa knows why those copper rimmed eyes held his eyes with a glint even when he was whispering lust-coated lies to someone else. 

_You can touch me better, Kiyoomi. And I can touch you better than this._

Atsumu would run his finger up and over his hips, down every single ridge of his spine and fuck the pain out of him on nights when they are together, just sheets and flesh. It stays in vivid clarity between them, the way he would lick the lust between the gaps of Kiyoomi's fingers and colour the expanse of his skin, claiming him. Marks and lingering traces of his lips that would be gentle reminders that say _you are the fresco upon which I kiss my art into._ How he would wrap his hands around his curls and silently gloat in the moans escaping past Sakusa's lips. 

They both know no one can be a better canvas for Atsumu than Kiyoomi. 

They aren’t strangers and they tumble into each other, skins and bones, fitting in all the right curves and spaces. Their lust is the afterglow of a past, so who would dare compete with that?

So like all stupid people do when they are in love, Sakusa had obliged and caved in, watching him and never moving his gaze from his face. Knowing so damn well that if Atsumu were to turn up at his door that night, he would have thrown open the door and let him in. 

Because you see, Sakusa Kiyoomi wants the storm if he can't have the gentle rain and Miya Atsumu is a very pretty, alluring hurricane. 

_Uppercut_

Sighing, he holds the punching bag with both his hands abruptly bringing it to a halt and then rests his forehead on it. 

_He hates him._

  
  


It had started slowly, the way Miya fell out of love with him. 

The walls they built chipped away in little details and suddenly their love didn’t fit so seamlessly, like the puzzle pieces got wet and warped, now no longer filling in each other’s spaces. It was in the _I’m tired today_ and _Maybe, I’ll be late_ which Atsumu began to leave in voicemails. They piled up, like the unspoken words between them when they sat together for meals and Sakusa began to wonder if strangers on the train hold longer conversations than they did. It was when the 2 inches between them while sleeping slowly began to expand and before he knew, five inches became sleeping in offices and sleeping in bars. How there were more things being said under breaths, in low tone than sentences spoken to each other. There were no fights but they began to tiptoe around each other, evading, avoiding and then lashing out on each other at night when they made love, clawing and pulling each other closer as if they could save themselves if they were nothing but skins and sheets.

And Sakusa had tried. 

He had enough love for both of them or so he thought. Thus he spent days excusing the nights, the kitchen silence, the space, the traces of alcohol which grew more overpowering with each day. But you can’t make someone love you when they don’t want to anymore. 

It happened on a November evening in the third year of their relationship.

That year, they never got to see the first snow together.

There were no grand fights or yelling, none of the _throwing clothes out in the hallway_ or the begging and pleading. So different from the way they fell in love, their break up was quiet and in muted, unsaid conversations. Like Miya woke up one day and decided to cut the string, while the truth was he had let go of it a long time ago and only Sakusa had been holding it for both of them. Maybe Sakusa should have known because Miya came home early that night and they both had sat down on the dining table together for the first time in a long while. There were all the signs and yet he had chosen to ignore them like always. 

And it was cruel the way he left. 

But Sakusa knew it would have been crueler if he stayed.

Heartbreak, Sakusa realized then, is a dull sensation like gunshots muffled by building blocks or a pebble sinking into the sand. Nothing like earth-shattering or shrill screams, no grandiose or falling apart in loud body racking sobs, it’s just the silent feeling of losing the ground you were once standing on and having nothing to come home to. 

  
  


“If you hear me leaving in the morning, can you just excuse me one last time?”, he had asked, his spoon being placed too loudly on the table in the silence of the room and Kiyoomi’s heart that had gone silent.

“Would that make it easier for us? Easier for you?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. But I think it will make it easier for you to hate me.”

Sakusa had chuckled harshly then, before getting up to do the dishes.

He had so much to say then, words and more words stuck in his throat.

Of how Miya Atsumu taught him to love but not how to unlove and how incredibly selfish that was, of how his love was like a falling star, burning so brightly and lighting up the space before disappearing, of how he was everything beautiful Kiyoomi was fated to love.

Or of how Sakusa would always be a little bit of him. Even if Miya left.

But he let the words die in his throat choosing to save the bit of his dignity that he had saved till then.

“If you leave tomorrow then don’t come back. I can’t fall out of love so easily, Miya. That’s not how love works because we don’t wake up one day and decide to hate the person we love. But I’m not going to stop you and you can go, you can leave whenever you want. Just don’t walk back in through the door.”

  
  


That was the first time Sakusa had heard silence so loudly. 

Kiyoomi didn’t beg for him to stay and Miya didn’t either, leaving nothing but a note saying _Thank You_ and a crumpled Sakusa on the floor in his wake.

  
  
  
  
  


And that should have been the end of them.

But you see, if they had too much fire within them which the skin of their relationship could not hold in, it only burned brighter when they became apart. And Miya Atsumu is an expert in keeping lines blurry and he knows exactly how his body haunts Sakusa- lingering love poems written through his touch. For if Miya is the shrine, Kiyoomi is the servant.

_Miya Kiyoomi._

What an irony.

Atsumu had kissed him everywhere : under the stars, in the park, in the middle of the crossing, between sheets and in every beautiful place in his memory. And so when he left, he left the taste of his lips mixed with the metallic bitter taste of heartbreak and yearning, destroying every beautiful place Kiyoomi knew. 

Hence he craved and craved for phantom illusions of the beautiful places in his memory. 

So when it came in the form of a drunk Miya outside his door on a December midnight, Sakusa’s fingers wrapped around his wrist and dragged him in, knowing he would be gone the next morning and how his clothes then had unfamiliar scents and how he knew that strang hands touched Miya in places he did before, places he called _his_ before.

But Kiyoomi didn’t care, he would take every bit of Miya he could get and that’s how they became lovers.

_Lovers._

He hates the word. The stain of what’s unfamilial, just the intertwining of their lean bodies under the cover of darkness, not knowing if Atsumu’s eyes hold more than lust. He hates how layered the word is. How it defeats its very own origin. It’s just hues of grey and there is no beginning and no end.

: To love and to be loved.

: To tangle more than just his body with Miya.

Lovers don’t do that.

_Do you miss me?_

_Will you stay the night?_

_Can we be more than this?_

Lovers don’t ask these. But Sakusa does, in his head, in his heart, in the kisses he leaves on the expanse of Miya’s skin like a fervent prayer.

And so he knows.

_He loves him._

_Still._

  
  
  
  
  


He lets go of the punching bag, wincing from the memories and the pain throbbing in his bruised knuckles. Turning around, he bends to press down on his knee when he feels the blast of cold wind slipping into the hall as the door opens. He doesn’t have to look up.

Kiyoomi knows him by his shadow, by the shift in the air between them, by the way his lungs suddenly gasp for oxygen even in a room full of air. He knows him by his existence alone and even with his eyes closed, he will know his presence. For he is tattooed in his soul and in his skin, filling up his bones and cavities.

_Miya_

_Miya_

_Miya_

“I knew I would find you here. Isn’t it too late to be sweating out in a hall?”

His honeyed voice rings out in the silence, his footsteps the only other sound bouncing off the wall. 

Kiyoomi doesn’t answer and instead walks towards his bag kept recklessly on the ground bending to pick up the water bottle.From the corner of his eyes, he sees Miya saunter towards him with his hands buried deep into his pockets.

Cracking his neck, Sakusa lifts the bottle, touching the tip to his mouth when he feels a strong grip pull his wrist away, calloused yet gentle fingers pressing into the concave of his palm

“What are you doing, Atsumu? Can you not see I was trying to drink water?”

He hisses, willing his mind to ignore the burning sensation ripping through his skin at the touch.

“What am I doing? What are you doing, Sakusa? Do you not see the condition of your knuckles?”

It’s low, his voice. It’s gruff and spoken in rushed breaths but he doesn’t loosen his grip forcing Sakusa to face him. It stays in the air between them that they have long stopped calling each other by their first names. That would sound tender, delicate and almost as if they are still in love.

Sakusa notices his knuckles under the dim glow of the nightlight. He knew the moment he had started throwing punches randomly that they would get bloodied but he has to admit, they look terrible and painful. The grey cotton tape is no longer grey but a swirling mess of grey,crimson and patches of bright red near the curves of his knuckles.

He doesn’t realize when Atsumu pushes him towards the window sill and forces him to sit before proceeding to unwrap the tap gently. His long fingers move swiftly, hovering lightly over his knuckles before cautiously unwinding the tape. The burning intensifies and Kiyoomi doesn’t know anymore if it’s from his bruised knuckles or Miya’s fingers, illuminated flaming gold by the light from outside.

“I hate you.”

He whispers, the pain increasing in folds. It’s not the bruised knuckles anymore and he knows. It’s the man in front of him and the bridge he burned.

“I know.”

“I hate you. I hate you so fucking much.”

Kiyoomi weakly attempts to pull his hand away but he craves the touch even before the contact breaks and Miya grabs his hand tighter, dabbing his handkerchief softly over the cuts.

“If you want me to leave, I will. Just let me clean this up for you because I don’t think you will tend to them, okay?”

It isn’t a question.

Sakusa doesn’t say another word, biting down on his bottom lip till he can taste the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. He watches as Atsumu finishes up, using his handkerchief as a makeshift gauze bandage and wrapping it around his hand. Sighing, the blond man briefly runs his piercing gaze across the length of his hand and Sakusa trembles in his bones.

“Do you want-?”

“No.” 

He speaks in quiet surrenderance. 

“Just stay for tonight. It’s not like you will be there in the morning when I wake up.”

If Atsumu catches the accusing bitterness laced in his words, he doesn’t seem to mind.

“Okay then. Maybe I should go gentle on you tonight. Do you want that?”

“What? Why would I want that, Atsumu?”

The blonde lets out a harsh chuckle, running his fingers through his hair.

“You are injured, Kiyoomi.I’m not heartless you know? I can just stay the night if you want me to and we can just not do anything.”

Kiyoomi stiffens at the way his name rolled off so easily off Miya's tongue, sounding so painfully familiar and so achingly tender.

He fights the urge to look into Miya’s eyes of ichor and instead forces himself to bore holes into the ground with his eyes. Miya is in his breathing space yet he doesn’t dare look into his eyes. Kiyoomi built a home in them and when he is not underneath Atsumu’s lean body, flushed skin and under the cover of darkness in his room, it is too easy to believe that he can find home in those eyes again.

So like he did before and like he does now, every time his resolve starts weakening, Sakusa builds his wall up higher. 

He scoffs bitterly before grabbing Miya’s collar and pulling him closer, eyes still evading.

“That’s not what lovers do Miya.” 

He spits the name out with all the hatred he can pitifully muster up and it burns his innards painfully because it's meant for love and all things beautiful. 

“Who knows,you might just end up falling for me again if you go gentle on me. We don’t want that, do we? You don’t want that.”

He doesn’t say _if you were heartless, I would have fallen out of love with you long ago._

He doesn’t say _tell me I’m wrong, tell me you will find a way to love me again._

There’s enough hold Miya has over Kiyoomi, in how his body exists in places where Miya touches him and the rest of him is smoke. In how when Kiyoomi lays naked in his arms, he holds his naked soul out too.

And so he tells Miya that he doesn’t love him anymore. Tells him they are nothing but lovers fueled by just lust, strangers with nothing but a past, so he asks him why would he want to go gentle on him? 

_Rage Miya._

_Rage into the night with me and teach me to hate._

_Kiss me here and kiss me there and there, in all the spots and maybe you will cover the ache you left behind atleast for tonight._

Because after all this time he knows, there is nothing gentle left in Miya Atsumu. 

_And so I swallow your body like meanings or whisky or_

_As you swallow me._

-Gerrit Lansing

A poem of love in eleven lines

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> ahh, im so glad yall read this fic. i would love to hear your thoughts in the comments or you can find me on twitter  
> @lovingoikawa_. thank you so much reading, much love and Happy Sakusa week!


End file.
